Dear Rosie, (Love Letters #2)

I feel like this sense of failure is going to pull me through the floor.

Because she’s right.

I didn’t read her cries for help.

And I wasn’t thinking of her when she was thinking of me.

Because I’d forgotten.

Like her last letter said. I’d forgotten all about my Rosie.

She was all alone, and I was living out my dreams.

I didn’t help her.

My lungs struggle to inhale.

I didn’t help her.

No one did.

“We gotta take care of somebody?” Tony’s low voice comes from the doorway.

He’s never sounded so serious. And it’s like I’m hearing the real him for the first time.

Because I know exactly what he means, and I kinda love him for it.

I shake my head. “He’s already dead.”

Tony grunts.

“I wish he wasn’t,” I whisper. “Whatever end he got… It wasn’t enough.”

EIGHTY

ROSALYN

Everything hurts as I open my eyes, and I wish I was still asleep.

At least the room is dark.

Lying in the partially inclined hospital bed, I turn my head toward the door.

It’s closed, but the glass top half of the door is letting in light from the hallway. Enough to see by, but not so much that my concussed brain screams at it.

I wiggle my toes and groan.

The doctors said it was a miracle I didn’t break anything. And I’m glad for that. I am. But a miracle would be not getting hit by a car in the first fucking place.

But miracles aren’t really my thing.

Foolishly, I try to flex my ankles.

My left protests at the attempt, the plastic brace cold on my skin as pain radiates up my leg.

I want another blanket.

I want to go home.